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Casey Meyering’s Revenge Porn Forum Rips off “TakedownHammer” Scam

One of the unfortunate aspects of revenge porn sites is that its creators, with few (if any) legitimate opportunities to profit via advertising, are often driven to extortionate “take down” scams. Recognizing that the men and women depicted on the sites are desperate to have their pictures removed, the sites advertise “take down” services by “independent” or “third party” companies that offer to negotiate to have their nude photos removed. Of course, these “take down” sites never disclose the fact that they’re operated by the same person running the revenge porn site, because that would start to sound a lot like extortion.

Take, for example, “WinByState,” a private forum (running VBulletin software) that allows users to view and submit “your ex-girlfriend, your current girlfriend, or any other girl that you might know.” To get access, users are required to submit photos, but must agree that they have “the person(s) permission who is in the picture/video[.]” If that were credible, few people would quarrel with the site — if people are comfortable with nude photos of themselves online, more power to them.

But if it were credible to claim that the people posted on the site are posted there with “permission,” why would the site advertise TakedownHammer.info, an “independent” and “third party” service that charges $250 to have photos removed? If this sounds familiar, it’s because Craig Brittain operated the same scam using the same name — and the text of this site is largely ripped off of Brittain’s now-defunct TakedownHammer.com.

Nor is this “TakedownHammer” remotely independent of the revenge porn-esque forum “WinByState”, as the site claims. A little digging into the ownership of both “WinByState” and “TakedownHammer.info” shows that both are owned (and apparently operated) by Casey Meyering of Tulsa, Oklahoma.

Almost all of the above websites were at one point registered to Casey Meyering or “KC” of various false addresses in Beverly Hills, California. (Get it? “KC”? Sigh.). Several of the websites are registered to Meyering using a WCPuppets.com email address. WCPuppets was once a porn site operated by Meyering which now redirects to revenge porn forum WinByState. Each of the above websites is hosted on the same server (identified as mazda.icertified.net in the headers of the emails sent when people register for an account on WinByState), and almost all of the sites hosted on the server are linked via whois records to Meyering. And here’s Meyering tweeting back and forth with iCertified, talking about his “mazda” server:

That might be enough to tie Meyering to the revenge porn forum, but what about the extortionate “TakedownHammer.info” site? Not only is it hosted on the same “mazda” server, but Meyering used the same Google Wallet account for both his drum lessons site and the “take down” site. That is, people who sign up for a drum lesson on Meyering’s drumming site will find that it lists their payment as going to “Takedown Hammer” at a fake address in Beverly Hills, California.

Now why would Meyering lie to his loyal customers about the nature and location of his business? You can draw your own conclusions. Shortly after I emailed Meyering asking for a comment (he never responded), his Twitter account was deleted.

Revenge pornographers don’t get much clumsier than this. And it’s a good thing, too. While the legality of revenge porn is the subject of much public debate, and law enforcement is unlikely to address the borderline-extortion perpetrated by sites such as Meyering’s, those running these sites can and should be exposed and criticized for their harmful acts. They hide their identities for a reason: so that they can expose, shame, and unethically take money from others without worrying about it disrupting their own lives too much.

While I’d love an opportunity to personally acquaint the operators of such sites with the business end of a fire extinguisher (hint: not the nozzle), for the *most* part, existing laws are probably sufficient. There is kind of a grey area in photo ownership + DMCA takedowns, though. Extortion should cover the rest of the bases.

He hasnt been in FM for almost 4 months now. The entirety of last year I told him to shut that site down. As far as I knew it was only a porn site and I was uncomfortable with it being just that.They did know about the site and all even had log-ins but they did not know he was charging people to remove their photos and whether or not they ever logged in is unknown. People that were close with him are now being harassed, as if the shame and embarrassment isnt already enough.

I’ve known Casey since we were in High School.. I was also a musician in the area so we typically ran around with the same crowds. He used to run around with this mutual friend that got caught making harassing phone calls to girls (making sexual noises) and sending pubic hairs to girls in the mail. We’d hear stories that Casey would join in on the sexual calls and all of the perverted stuff. Of course it’s only hearsay that Casey was ever involved with that particular mutual friend but with these latest developments it seems highly likely he’s had this addiction for a very long time.

[…] hacker”/porn actor behind Texxxan, the dubious dynamic duo running YouGotPosted, and the Oklahoman drummer operating WinByState; he is currently hunting down the owners of other such sites, many with names that I can’t […]

[…] — anywhere — of a revenge porn site owner. Casey Meyering, another site owner with a scheme identical to that of Craig Brittain, who reached a settlement with the FTC last week, also faces trial in California on extortion […]